I arrived over at SFM later, having hit an alternate cafe place, knowing the hotel one was getting slammed. I wandered, I knit, I played with my Ipod, it was all good. I spotted some pretty felted pins in a gift shop window just outside the hotel, but they didn't open until later. In my wanderings I ran into Yarnagogo and Lala. Lala had to get to work, so Yarnagogo and I went and staked out a table in the hotel atrium cafe.
Then there was lunch (free books), which was okay, and Yarnagogo and I broke out the knitting for the speech. Victoria Alexander was wonderfully entertaining and afterwords it was time to start with the workshops. Yarnagogo and I went to one on pitching and then I went to one by the Buzz Girls, of whom I was not that familiar, but I think I'm a fan now. (And I won the RITA nominated books from Simone Elkeles, so it was all good.)
I ran into famous author Christine Merrill hanging out in the lobby and told her that I had met her at Cherry Con - my you don't know you know me, but you do speech (I'm getting really good at that).
I went to the Red Sage social and got a cupcake and a book out of the deal.
I hung out for a while in the lobby, annoyed Robin D. Owens because I knew I knew her name and couldn't place it (could it be because I read Heartmate. She was very gracious, although she did move shortly after (not that I blame her.) Cherries began gathering in the lobby for the big Cherry dinner at Buca di Beppo. As we were congregating, a lovely woman who was having trouble sorting out the various stimuli in the lobby planted herself amid the group. People asked her name. She seemed confused. (She did give us her name, not that kind of confused.) We asked if she was a cherry - no response. We continued chatting, and she was still there, looking at us. I told her we were all very nice, and we could convert her to cherry-hood. (It's not that hard. There's not even a test.) Around then she decided to wander away from us. People accused me of scaring her.
Dinner was fabulous. Some local cherries had made arrangement for a pre-set meal so that simplified things. And yet, (or perhaps because) the staff was amazingly solicitous of us throughout the evening. We wandered back to SFM for Moonlight Madness where I bought a cute pin. This woman had cut possibly naughty sentences out and put them on pins. Mine says, "It's a little bit scandalous."
Food: Earl Grey, pesto salad, salad, chicken with risotto, cupcake, more salad, pizza, ravioli, fettucine alfredo, pesto salmon and chocolate cake.
